I started my book Weigh Every Day back in July of 2018. It's not my first book—that title goes to SQL Practice Problems. You'd think my second book would be easier. But Weigh Every Day is far more difficult to write than my first book.
My first book, SQL Practice Problems, practically wrote itself. This was mainly because I'd been collecting really good practice problems, illustrating common data issues, for a few years. So it was a matter of systematically working through them, putting them in the right order, writing the introduction, etc. I'm not saying that it was trivial, but I didn't have to struggle with what to actually say, and how to say it.
My new book Weigh Every Day is completely different. I have tons that I want to say, and loads of ideas to explore in it. I need to make the book very well organized, and very convincing. I want people to believe that what I'm saying about losing weight, and maintaining your weight. My goal is for readers to have an "aha" moment, and to make permanent changes in their life based on reading the book.
But all of these things that I want to say require lots of difficult, painstaking thought. It requires serious research, and planning. There's no recipes or detailed meal plans, which usually take up about half of most diet books, and are easy to come up with.
I'm strongly motivated to write the book. It'll be an interesting, novel and hopefully workable approach to the problem of overweight and obesity, which is truly an epidemic now. But the mental work that it takes is challenging.
My approach to actually working on the book—putting in the focused hours necessary to plan and write—has evolved through the past months.
I don't even try to write in the afternoon, and definitely not in the evening. It's odd—I can do technical work in the afternoon, and sometimes into the evening. For my database consulting gigs, if I have a specific problem to work on, and especially if I'm working directly with someone, I don't experience any kind of mental slowdown in the afternoon.
But if I'm writing on this new book, coming up with ideas on my own, and working through them to figure out the best way to say something—that's a completely different type of work. When it's all coming out of my head, and I'm not collaborating with anybody else, I need a very controlled work environment. My absolute best work time is in the morning, and that's the only time I can do this type of writing. I have to be very focused, with no distractions, so I work at a local co-working space instead of at home.
My kids were home from school two days this week because of snow. I stayed home with them one day, and it was a lost cause in terms of work—I got nothing done. I just can't stay focused with constant interruptions.
My target daily word-count is 1,000 words, just because it's a nice, round number. Once I hit that number, unless I'm on a real roll, I feel fine stopping for the day. Do I feel bad if I don't get 1,000 words done? No. I definitely feel better if I meet that goal, but honestly, some sections of the book are just much harder to write. And sometimes I need to do lots of reorganizing and editing, and that takes time.
I use the pomodoro technique for time management and focus. It's the essence of simplicity—you just do focused work for 25 or 30 minutes, then take a five break minute. And that's it! The only app I have open on my phone when I'm writing is a pomodoro app. It shows me a little timer, with how much time I have left. It also shows me how many pomodoros I've done that day, and that week. There's also a little tick-tock noise (very motivating) when the pomodoro starts. And that's pretty much all there is to it. The key is to save potentially distracting tasks (checking email, getting coffee, etc) for the breaks.
I made a checklist of things to do before starting work, to stay distraction-free. This involved items like
Close down all non-work tabs in the browser
Shut down all non-work programs on my laptop
Shut down all apps on my phone, except for my pomodoro app
Start up a word-counter website in my browser
Originally, my workflow was just to get to my co-working space relatively early in the morning, like 7:30. And then—I'd start writing whenever I felt like it. Or...whenever it "just happened".
Needless to say, that was a mistake. Sometimes I would feel like it at 10 am. A day like that would definitely be a low word-count day.
Now I have a goal of starting to write at 7:45. That works much better.
Previously, I started my pomodoro app only after I went through my pre-writing checklist. This was a big mistake. Now I first start the pomodoro, and then go through the checklist. That little adjustment gets me writing far more quickly.
If I feel that I absolutely just can't write anything, I'll go through a list that I keep, of idea and thoughts to put in the book. That will usually get me started. Also, as soon as I have anything written (even just a few sentences), I'll copy and paste it into the word-counter website. The word count may be just 20 or so, but it's motivating to see a number.
If I run into something interesting that's not book related while working, or if I think of something I need to do later in the day, I write it up into a text editing program I keep open. I go through that list daily, after I stop writing.
I'm very good at avoiding things that are completely not work-related, during my work time. Like news websites, for instance. What I do have a problem with is going down research rabbit-holes. A website or book looks useful, and I get into it for far too long. It's hard to reel myself back in, and start writing again.
Once I've gotten my final word count for the day, I put it into a spreadsheet that I keep in Google Sheets. I'm going to experiment with not checking email during my breaks. It has the potential to get me distracted, and there's really nothing that can't wait till the afternoon. If anyone really needs me, they could call.
And that's it! My goal is to be done with the book in a few months, but I have no firm deadline yet. Maybe that's the next thing I should do—set a firm deadline.
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